


Baby, We're Fireproof

by footlooseandfancybe



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Don't worry, Established Relationship, F/F, F/M, I Plead The Fifth, M/M, Multi, and everyone is happy, and yes the title is from a one direction song, bruce is asexual, clint and coulson have a very special relationship, i dunno if i'm actually gonna do stony, i'm a weak bitch so it probably will happen, it's all worked out and consensual, so the three of them snuggle a lot, we'll see, whattup
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-26
Updated: 2016-07-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 17:23:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3618054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/footlooseandfancybe/pseuds/footlooseandfancybe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Super heroes just keep turning up.....much to Coulson's glee and Hill's despair.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. What Tony Knew

**Author's Note:**

> so, this is a bit of a hodge-podge of the comics, the movies, and doing whatever i felt like. within reason. hope you like it!

Tony knew, without opening his eyes, that someone was staring at him. In an accusatory manner.

Tony was good at picking up on that sort of thing.

“Tony, there were fourteen bottles of gin in the lounge last night. Today, as of eleven o’clock in the morning, there are eight. Care to explain?” Pepper’s voice, dulcet normally, now sounded like klaxons.

“Pepper, Pepper, Pepper. Haven’t you realized yet there IS no ‘explaining’?” Tony frowned.

“Besides, Jarvis isn’t supposed to divulge those trade secrets.” His brow furrowed dangerously.

“Well I am the CEO of your company. Not to mention your occasional nurse maid.” She tried to sound irritated at that, but only somewhat managed it. They both knew there was no point disagreeing about whom owed whom.

“Drinking is good for the soul—“ He began in a sonorous voice, highly reminiscent of some big-picture villain.

“Tony.” Pepper warned. He could see her eyebrow viciously raised, though he hadn’t yet opened his eyes. He sighed, deciding maybe he’d cut a little bullshit out of Pepper’s life today.

“And Jarvis has a soft spot for me.” Tony snorted, then winced. Not too much bullshit.

“I wasn’t aware my actions were being monitored!” he exclaimed in mock surprise, gingerly feeling the bruise that had mysteriously formed on his temple.

“Well, I should say, worried about.” S.H.I.E.L.D’s observational style was hard to miss. When you were at Tony’s level, anyway. Pepper sighed.

“Why have you been—not—being—lately, Tony?”

“That, was eloquent. Even by my lowly standards, that was some—”

“Look at me.” He groaned, and screwed his eyelids shut even tighter. 

“I mean more than usual. You aren’t even passed out in the lab. What was it about yesterday. Hmm? That has you drinking like you’re seventeen again?”

Tony cracked his eyes ever so slightly. Of course he hadn’t consumed six bottles of gin. One had broken, one he’d instructed Jarvis to take care of, before passing out completely, and the other three and a quarter were of course the cause of the massive migraine throbbing between his ears, seizing his head like a vise.

Like he was seventeen…that set off a predictable chain reaction of memories: finishing his PhD programs (simultaneously), getting wasted his only reward; phone calls exchanged and ending in no promises at all; a baseball bat connecting with the telephone pole where his head had been moments before, all those T.A.s, taking advantage that they knew that HE knew that Tony didn’t need to sleep with any of them to get a good grade. 

“Anything on the scanner? Or from Big Brother?” His eyes were okay with this level of light now. Pepper stood in front of his chair, hands clasped before her, and a concerned look on her face. Her lips struggled to smirk, but she pushed away the thought. It was simple. So simple to read a face. Factor in biases, race, gender, upbringing, and you have a whole person. Yet somehow, he always managed to disappoint her.

Faces were deceptive, Tony wheedled with himself. Faces, change. Who was to blame for a little miscommunication? ‘Your greatest failure, Tony’ a tiny voice whispered back. Ah. The other reason why being seventeen again was necessary.

“No and yes.”

“To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet…..T.S. Eliot said that.”

It was silent for a while. Pepper looked more apprehensive than ever.

“I think you need to—“

“Yes, I’m sure I would, Pepper.” He got a firm hold on his stomach and hauled himself out of the chair. She stepped back.

“No—no, Tony. This is serious. You need breakfast and a shave—and some coffee—“ she tacked on, as Tony’s knees buckled beneath him. He ground his teeth together.

“Just do what you do, Pep. No one has a use for me right now, do they?”He let his words fill with accusations and reproach, although he wholeheartedly agreed with the words. Who needed Tony? No one. Especially not Tony. The look of hurt flashed in her eyes, as familiar as the arc reactor. That was an amusing thought. Perhaps they were one and the same.

He managed to stagger out of the room, leaving Pepper to throw up her arms in resignation.

“If you would just listen for five minutes--!”

“Woulda shoulda coulda!”

“Tony it’s about Cap—” The door slammed shut. It almost made him throw up, but difficult and hardened years of practice clamped down on his gag reflex and the feeling passed.

Once in the lab, he surveyed the new landscape. Tony hadn’t been able to convince his nostalgia, or gut, or smugness or whatever it was to tear out the particle accelerator he’d cobbled together. Somehow, it stood as an ugly, bitch-faced reminder of how things just didn’t want to go smoothly.

The new flow of the lab almost creeped Tony out, if he was really going to be truthy. This room was—his. His turf; the place that made sense the most, the complexities and vastness of what it held hiding him from all sorts of other—things.

He spied a pile of computer tablets, ones with new equipment designs for “Avengers! The Musical” as he not-so-fondly referred to the big happy family he was a part of now.

Definitely not high on the list. Not after the mission the day before. Tony put a hand over his eyes, willing the migraine to do what the drinking couldn’t, and block out those images. No, something stronger. Work. Yes. That’s what he needed; booze to numb it, work to relax it away, or however that went.

Some good old fashioned inventing would do the trick….

Or maybe work too well. It would have felt like an hour had gone by, had it not been for his instinctual knowledge that he’d lost track of time, once again. 

He happened to be working under one of his many incarnations of what you could call a motorcycle, if it didn’t have quite this many guns worked seamlessly into the—well—seams, when it happened. Rhodey would probably call it a mirroring of Tony’s personality, but what could he say? His love of firearms didn’t necessarily have to die with the company’s lack of production.

“Shit—sonova bitch!” The two women, their faces frozen in terror, most certainly in rigor mortis loomed in his inner eye. Tony jerked away, eyes slamming shut, hitting his already bruised temple on the toolbox nearby. Heart pounding, he heard tools and parts skitter away on the concrete floor.

They’d been too late—hadn’t been able to head off Loki’s attack. Usually they were armed to the teeth and ready. But this time, NYPD’s finest got the brunt of it. New York had been a warzone for several hours before they’d managed to pull Natasha out of whatever black-ops thing she was organizing, Clint from his training mission in Nigeria, wake Bruce up from his meditation tank. Loki thought it was time to wake all of them up. 

So when Tony swooped low for cover between a couple of tenement high-rises, from the machine-droid things that had too many arms for his taste, he saw them. Sure, there were plenty of huddled forms and motionless bodies on the asphalt, but they stood out. Between the wreckage of several over-turned police cars, desolate and alone. Wrapped in each others arms, her bright blonde hair furling across the pavement in bright Technicolor through the helmet. 

The sudden unfairness had hit him like—well—like something really REALLY heavy. Tony had to laugh at himself for the stupid lack of analogy, and his stupid lack of foresight, and his stupid slow reaction time, and his stupid stupidness until he was gripping the wrench enough to make his knuckles go white. 

So yeah. They’d managed to drive Loki off—for now. Standing on the corner of 3rd and Tito Puente Way, face plate up, staring at the wreckage and destruction, waiting for the clean-crew to come and relieve them, Coulson coaxing Bruce back into going for some more meditation—the guy really did need it— Natasha grumbling about her cover being blown and declaring Malibu for the weekend. Clint hadn’t said a word, just stared at Tony, as though tracking something in a jungle. Tony gave him his best ‘you’re icky too’ face and turned to ask Thor what he was going to do.  
But Thor wasn’t there anymore. Just gone. He’d flown off, and perched himself at the top of the Statue of Liberty, Tony later discovered, and couldn’t be coaxed down until Agent Hill had thought to call Jane. Who doesn’t call Jane first when it comes to that mountain of medieval colloquialisms? Tony wondered, staring into the blackness of his eyelids. Someone stupid, that’s who.

He must have voiced the question aloud, because Jarvis replied: “Yes, Agent Thor is currently not residing on the statue, but at S.H.I.E.L.D Headquarters. Ms. Potts is as well.” Luckily all of the earpieces the Avengers wore were Stark tech. Even if they weren’t, Tony had known how to rig tracking devices since he was twelve.

“You’re like that annoying grandmother I don’t have who decides to inform me of things that I don’t care about,”

“Will that be all, sir?” Tony let go of the wrench, and scrubbed his hands over his eyes, the film of the fight still playing in the background.

“Now, I know this might be a little strange, sweetheart, but I couldn’t trouble you for the time? And date?”

“Your sense of humor, as always, belies the fact that it is one a.m. on Thursday the fourth and you haven’t eaten in approximately twenty-four hours. I do trust, sir, that you haven’t forgotten the month?”

“Well at least the headache’s gone!” Tony stopped, and hit replay on his internal feedback loop.

“Hang on. You said, Pepper’s, at S.H.I.E.L.D. At one o’clock in the morning.” Tony was pretty sure if Jarvis had eyebrows, they’d be raised right now.

“Indeed, sir.”

“Jarvis, make a note: never let me create a holographic projection of you. That’s, that’s important. Never never ever.” Jarvis was silent a moment.

“Done, sir. And may I agree with the wisdom of this decision.” Tony decided he’d had enough of lying under the motorcycle and gently wheeled away on the dolly. 

“So, care to tell me why she’s at S.H.I.E.L.D?” He wandered over to the main console, pulling up the schematics he knew he’d hastily doodled sometime during this latest sojourn down the rabbit hole. They were for a commercial jet-engine, two different organ prostheses, and unfortunately a holograph projection module. Well, it was kinda cool, if Tony had to admit it. The numbers for the exact mirror angle placements, the R.A.M space it required spilled from his memory. 

“Forgive me for interrupting, sir, but were you in fact requesting I hack the S.H.I.E.L.D database or…?” the A.I. lacked any sort of judgmental inflection. It was a simple question. The numbers from that coding sequence crowded in next, a tricky piece that Tony swears he’d have to be drunk in order to remember exactly how to place them.   
He knows he thinks too much. Numbers, crowding, jostling, bumping, pleading for his attention, memories, Pepper, Rhodes, the Team, the empty house above him, the particle accelerator looming out of the corner.

The fucking glowing thing sticking out of his chest.

It’s all bouncing around his brain, constantly. 

Tony realized he was still flipping through the console, designs from ages ago, up-to-the-minute news reports, a live feed of the Mars rover, a banner with up-to-date CERN reports, the weather in six different countries…..

“You know what, no. I think I’ll drop in on ol’ Fury myself and see what’s got everyone’s panties in a twist.”

“Very good sir. The other jet, or perhaps something faster?” Tony clenched his jaw shut, hand automatically forming a fist. He had to get back on the horse, otherwise the horse was going to kick his ass. Every time. He nodded once, more to himself than anything, and grabbed the briefcase suit.

It was only when they were quietly cruising over Des Moines did Jarvis say,

“Very good, sir.”


	2. Introspection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jane does science and deals with her significant other.

“Um, Thor?”

 

Jane took a deep breath. 

“Thor I know you can hear me.” She wasn’t ever stern or angry with her demi-god boyfriend, but there was always a time to experiment. She opened her mouth to talk into the bluetooth and—

“I know what you would say to me. I do not wish to speak just yet, even to you, my lovely Jane.” She heard the wind gust ferociously past the ear piece, imagining Thor’s shoulder-length hair whipping about. Jane wondered if it ever got in his eyes, or if he ever wanted to chop it all off. She shook her head. This wasn’t getting anywhere.

“No, Thor, I’m not going to let you brood and sulk, especially somewhere I can’t get to. You’ve never let me stew in my own head, so I’ll do you the same courtesy and drag a counseling session out of you. You either get down off that stupid monument to cheese-eating surrender monkeys and come back to S.H.I.E.L.D and talk to me, or we do this right now.” A very surprised silence echoed back over the line. If a silence could be surprised, that is.

“What do you wish to ‘do’?”

“Talk about why you’re skulking.”

“At the top of a large woman dedicated to—“

“Cheese-eating surrender monkeys, yes.” Another pause, then a quiet, defeated sigh.

“I am saddened by the Midgardians who did not live to see another sunrise. They are not my people. But their lives affected Asgard, and the other nine worlds, and the loss is echoed through the Yggdrasil.”

“That, that’s—“ Jane had to struggle past the feeling that always blossomed in her chest, when she thought of the strange and brilliant expanse that the universe stretched to: Thor, the kindest, bravest, most understanding person she’d ever met; Darcy, snot-nosed, but loyal to the last; Erik, another father, only one who understood particle physics. All the undiscovered leagues that space spread to fill. The inter-connectedness that Thor spoke of and took very seriously was one of the reasons she fell in love with him.

“Benevolent of you, Thor. Thank you. Somehow, I get the feeling….” She almost couldn’t finish the thought, because it was too fresh, too close.

“That is not why.” It had to be finished. And Thor did finish it.

“It’s Loki. Isn’t it.” Jane pressed. She could feel Agent Hill’s eyes burning a hole in the back of her head. It wasn’t going to be much longer until the news helicopters picked themselves up off their asses and started swarming the Statue of Liberty, national security be damned. Thor heaved a deep sigh.

“One’s kinda connected to the other, nowadays, isn’t it?”

“Yes, Jane. My brother must see the deaths and carnage he is causing. He must! But if he does, then I cannot continue to hope for any other welcome for him in Asgard, other than punishment. For I will take him back home, back to our father. Perhaps even to his father.” Thor’s voice dipped into dangerous levels of deep and gruff, and Jane knew this was going to be the first of many cliffs she would need to talk him down off of. Her next words would probably influence whether or not Loki went home in one piece. And oh, how she hoped he wouldn’t.

“You love him, Thor. He is your brother. You grew up with him, have fought next to him, done really stupid things with him. This is your first, erm, fight, I suppose you could call it,” Thor snorted.

“Can this inter-dimensional declaration of war truly be deemed a ‘quarrel’, dear Jane?” he didn’t sound angry, just tired. Jane bit her lip.

“Alright, maybe the deaths and destruction and chaos part can’t, but what’s going on between you can. Not the parts where he’s killed people-and, um, you. He didn’t learn the same things as you have, Thor. He can’t understand the things you’ve just said to me, about Yggdrasil and how we are all connected. But don’t you want to fix things, teach him what you’ve learned? To tell him how you feel and to mend the gap?” she had to pause to laugh a little bit.  
“What do you find amusing, Jane?” Thor sounded fascinated. Sometimes Jane wondered if he didn’t stop her pointless babble because he wanted to see how long she’d go on before she stopped herself.

“I can’t help, can’t help but think your relationship is a little like the Bifrost. It’s broken, partially destroyed, but with good intentions. And the two worlds, can’t understand each other now. You just have to fix the bridge. Well, the metaphorical bridge, not the actual bridge. That’s me and Erik and Darcy’s job. So.” Thor actually laughed at this, and the knot in Jane’s chest uncurled itself a little.

“I understand what you are saying Jane. But this ‘bridge’ is going to need a lot of, what is that sticky substance—“

“Glue?” She could almost see the annoyance pooling in his bright blue eyes. 

“It comes in—lengths—and many colors—” Jane laughed outright, now that the scary moments had passed. The understanding Thor expressed, of the people around him, terrified her at times. She sometimes even wondered what he saw in her—behind all the science and mathematics. Not what he valued her for, no, just. What did she look like to him, on the inside?

“Duct Tape.”

“Yes. Our brotherhood will require much duct tape,” he pronounced the words carefully.

“If we wish it to function as it once did.” 

Jane paused over this.

“Maybe, it needs to work differently now.”

“Are you implying, Jane, that I must learn to work around my brother’s newly acquired taste for genocidal chaos? Because I will not.”The steel reentered his voice, making her wince.

“No, I just—I just want you to be happy. I don’t know how, Thor, to work around a sibling’s homicidal tendencies, I just want you two to not fight anymore.” Jane snapped. She ran a hand through her hair, anxiety making her scribble at the corners of her notes. Agent Hill now paced behind her, still out of sight.

“I should not have done this, Jane, I apologize. You are no better equipped than I to know what should be done about Loki. And I am not, unhappy. I use my powers to help others, I learn new things every day, and spend time with the Lady Darcy and Erik,” it was a funny little subconscious idiosyncrasy (at least Jane hypothesized it was subconscious) that Thor had developed, or perhaps had all his life, giving every person and every action performed a different inflection, a different feeling to evoke. 

Like treating Darcy with such candid and affectionate reverence even when saying her name, and Erik as ‘Erik’. He was, Erik. Or Director Fury’s name with gruff, grudging comradeship. Natasha had garnered a special, puppy-like following out of him; her name was pronounced with bubbles under his tongue. Jane theorized it was her impassive and cool regard for everything, even Thor. Though quite frankly, Jane could not imagine how anyone was immune the giant man’s charm.

“And I have you, my wonderful, my brilliant, my passionate Jane. I no longer imagine a world that does not have you existing in it. I will come down, and we will finish ‘this’ in a place you are able to go. Please, accept my deepest apologies. I have been acting almost as childishly as Loki.” Jane breathed a silent sigh of relief. At least he’s coming down.

“We stopped your brother the first time he tried to annihilate some population of the world, I think you’re allowed a freebie.” A confused pause.

“I am sorry Jane, but I do not—”

“It’s okay, I’ll explain it when you get back.”

“I do very much wish to speak with you, but Director Fury requested that I direct some diplomatic documents for the council, and Agent, Son of—Coulson, will wish to debrief me. And you must have work that needs completion, Jane. Do not let me distract you.” She shook her head. Thor was never not a distraction. Darcy wandered into Jane’s line of vision, idly flapping some papers at her.

“Hang up on your emo-demi-god boyfriend, Jane-o. We still got data to corral on this puppy. Hi Thor!” The Bifrost had fired off some excess energy when Heimdall had attempted more of a connection with the terminal she and Darcy and Erik were building. They were currently storing and filtering data from the event.

“Hello, Lady Darcy. I hope your errant data will cooperate more than the weather is now,” Thor responded conversationally.

“It’s raining?” Jane asked, surprised. Darcy gave her that look, the one that said she was letting her brain run away before her mouth. It was Thor’s turn to laugh.

“Yes, it is rather ferocious, not unlike some Asgardian tempests. I will take you both sailing on my father’s flag vessel one day. No, Lady Darcy, no I will not use Mjolnir to create more thunder. I doubt the loudest thunder could penetrate to the Shield basement laboratory anyways.” Thor’s voice was tiredly fond. Jane laughed again as the younger girl pouted.

“See you back at base, Thor.” Darcy smirked at Jane, but graciously sauntered away when the older woman furiously pointed her out of earshot. Jane turned her back, just to be sure.

“Until later, Lady Darcy.” She smiled fondly at his affectionate farewell. Darcy sashayed back to where Erik was furiously tugging at some fiber-optic cables spewing from the depths of the main computer hub, swearing in Norse.

“I love you, Thor.” A gentle pause.

“And I you, Jane.” They cut the connection at that. Nothing was left to be said. Jane nodded briefly at Agent Hill, and handed back the headset. Fury's left-hand nodded curtly back, and marched over to the stairs. The woman insisted on running the stairs all the time, except in times of emergency. Claimed it kept her fresh. 

Jane let the equations and spread of data on the computer screens seduce afresh, a science-oblivion with nothing but numbers and trends. It wasn’t comforting, but it was certainly easier than trying to untangle the enigma that was Thor and Loki

 

Thor was feeling distinctly sodden as he strode through the sliding doors of Shield headquarters, cape flapping in the strong gusts, Mjolnir slung casually on his belt, hair wild and knotted and plastered to his head. No matter; a simple toweling off was in order. 

Several agents seemed to be staring at him as he made his way over to the bank of elevators. Perhaps they missed him. He tried a small wave in their direction, and every eye turned away. It didn’t bother him; the Midgardians who worked in these little nests in the great Shield complex were not very enthusiastic when it came to greetings.

Thor was rewarded for choosing the furthest elevator to the left when Hawkeye’s startled face appeared, probably mirroring his own. He was fond of the man because of his exemplary abilities with the bow and arrow, and he felt it was severely under-used in Midgard. Perhaps it was not as fast or conventional as the—fire sticks, guns, or Lady Darcy’s Taser, but was beautifully and extremely effective. From what the son of Coul had told him, Barton had been present during the situation in New Mexico, and had told the Agent, in so many words, that Barton preferred him to win the fight that had erupted in the compound. Had hesitated to shoot him when Thor had been desperate to reach Mjolnir.

“Barton! It is a wonderful coincidence to have met you here. I did not manage to congratulate you on firing the shot that brought down the controlling robot! Masterfully accomplished!” Thor boomed as he strode into the elevator. The corners of Barton’s mouth turned suspiciously down while his eyes gleamed, but he simply pressed the button for the fifth floor: Fury’s office.

“Thanks Thor. You were great—with the flying and hammer stuff—you have fun out on the statue? It’s nine o’clock at night, after all.” Water steadily dribbled onto the floor from Thor’s cape. He frowned, pondering how much to tell the archer.

“It gave me sufficient time to think, yes, thank you. But, Jane would not let me stay any longer, and I must agree. She is very wise.” Thor smiled absently into the air, conjuring up his favorite image he had of Jane: curled up in a chair in the records room, poring over data from decades past, glasses glinting slightly in the dim light, mug of coffee forgotten by her elbow.

“Um, right. Great. Coulson’s waiting up with Fury, going over god-knows what information on the fight. They want your report.” It was silent for a few moments before Barton’s eyes shifted uneasily to settle on Thor’s reflection in the mirrored surface of the elevator.

“You didn’t notice anything, strange, with Stark today, did you?” Thor looked at the man, but Barton refused to meet his eyes. The elevator doors opened and both of them strode out, navigating the maze of offices to Fury’s little out of the way center of operations. The old warrior liked to stay unobtrusive and embedded within his working forces. Thor admired him for the tactics he employed, treating Shield like a vast spider web, or like his own mother’s loom; every strand observed, monitored, deployed to their strengths.

“I do not know what kind of behavior you would be referring to. What actions are not disjointed and fueled by battle rage during, a battle?” Thor wished Barton would not dance around these questions. It was important that everyone on the team be well enough to fight. 

“He seemed kinda, manic? Green in the face.” Thor opened his mouth to ask if a human’s face could truly turn such a color when Barton put up a hand.

“I mean, he looked sick, like he’d seen something he’d rather not’ve seen.” Barton still wouldn’t meet his eyes. Thor pondered this. He wished that he could tell the archer something to comfort him, but Thor had been embroiled in his own inner turmoil, and had wished to be rid of his companions as quickly as possible.

Barton and Thor arrived at the Director’s office, and Thor leveled his gaze fully at the man next to him.

“I do not recall behavior which Anthony may have exhibited before or during the battle which would merit concern. I am afraid, that I was not paying him, or the rest of you, any mind after the battle, for which I apologize.” Clint finally looked up at Thor, holding the demigod’s gaze. Thor was pleased with this.

“Right, right, your brother and everything,” Thor must have looked startled because Clint raised an eyebrow.  
“Well, it makes sense. You don’t stop caring about someone, even if they’re being a dick. Whatever. It’s Stark’s problem. Or maybe I’ll make it Nat’s problem.” He grinned rather maliciously at this thought. Thor was reminded forcibly, though not unpleasantly, of Loki, and returned the smile dubiously.

“Welp, I’m off to see if that dream can become a reality. Knock ‘em dead, soldier.” Clint gave him a slap on the arm, Thor’s shoulder too far away, and sauntered off, whistling merrily. A few hours later, the irony of the statement would entertain Thor deeply.

 

“Making any head-way on that strand, Jane?” Erik’s gruff but gentle voice interrupted her thoughts, and work. Her shoulders ached brutally from crouching at the work station beside the control panel of the Hub. That was what Darcy, Erik, and Jane had dubbed the revolutionary machine. Jane sometimes didn’t know whether to call it a computer or an artist’s easel.

//////

After Thor and his companions had disappeared through the Bifrost Bridge, Agent Coulson had sidled up to her, staring up at the brilliant New Mexico sky.  
“Agent Coulson?”  
“Yes?”  
“Do you—possibly—is there any way—”  
“I think we can make some arrangements.”  
“Because he can’t come back without—without my help—and we need him to come back.” Coulson stared thoughtfully across the desert, uncaring as the wind whipped his tie into a frenzy.  
“Yes. We all need him back.”

/////////

Jane sighed again. Erik had turned back to the touchscreen, manipulating the patterns that flashed in thousands of colors there. Stark and the other Shield engineers had explained that they’d transformed the patterns of the wormhole events into something like computer code, letting the physicists enter specific spacial demands or energy levels and the Asgardian, pictograms, for lack of a better term, would respond accordingly.

At least, that’s what they were working towards. The patterns and colors were immensely complex, and they couldn’t ask Heimdall to continually bombard the Hub with rays of the energy for more data. It’d wear a hole in the reality around them and let all sorts of other things in.

So they were confined to regularized bursts, usually bi-weekly.

The only thing that had made any of this possible, that had lent any clue at all that the patterns were in fact a language that both species struggled to understand, was the Tesseract. The Hub was built entirely around that little glowing cube, tapping into its endless energy supply and itself seemed to be made out of the swirling patterns that appeared in the sky and on lonely fields in New Mexico. S.H.I.E.L.D forces had fished it out of the Arctic Ocean several months before.

None of them were exactly sure of how the Tesseract managed to contact the Observatory, but one day a nearly eight-foot tall man wearing golden armor had appeared in the Laboratory, causing the alert level to rocket all the way up to eleven and Darcy to pull out her Taser, crying “I nailed one of you bastards before, I can do it again!”

Jane had hardly gotten any sleep that whole week. Astrophysics, and Thor. What more could a woman ask for?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> apologies to french people everywhere.


	3. Time to Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "How terrible it is to love something that death can touch."  
> ~Anonymous

Seventy Seven Years, Nine months, Fourteen Days, Six Hours, and Thirty Minutes Ago.

He had meant to say toes.

The glacier had other ideas; the impact tore the air from his lungs, a colossal concussive force rattling his bones, setting his heart thumping harder and faster. He was up and out of the cockpit seat before he actually knew what he was doing, racing for the tail of the aircraft, the survival instincts he’d been honing for the past year and a half putting his muscles on autopilot.

The steel bulkheads and girders were violently shaking, the floor pitching and tossing like a ship at sea. Steve could feel the craft digging itself deeper into the ice and snow with every teeth rattling bounce; but he still managed to reach the reinforced door and grab a hold, praying he had enough time before—

A massive explosion rocked the plane, originating in the fuselage, if he had to take a guess. Steve and the door flew backwards, flames licking greedily, searching for oxygen. The searing heat on his face and numbingly cold wind at his back from where the glass panels were smashed and ripped away; Steve imagined that this was what hell felt like: unbearable fury, locked in eternal conflict.

He managed to lift the shield just in time to keep the door and flying glass from slicing his face open. It changed his trajectory abruptly, sending him crashing into the side of the control room, robbing his lungs of oxygen once more.

Steve managed to drag himself upright, easing his back against the wall, wincing as he shifted around his broken ribs and the dozen or so gashes covering his legs. Shrapnel was, as Bucky would say, a bitch.

Bucky. Oh god. He hadn’t managed to find his body, or say goodbye. He hadn’t even been able to get drunk in the stupid bastard’s name; despite himself, Steve felt tears prickling behind his eyelids. He cursed himself some more, forcibly not thinking about the quaver in Peggy’s voice as she’d promised him a dance.

He could hear the flames eating away at the walls, letting even more snow and wind in, biting at Steve’s cheeks and whipping his hair around. If that explosion had been in the engines, it would only be a few more minutes before it reached the bomb-bays and the reactionary cargo there.

“I’m sorry…..Peggy, I tried. I wish I could tell you….” He managed to rasp out, before he just couldn’t say any more. The smoke was making it hard to breathe, and the still shifting and bucking floor made him feel sick.

Another massive explosion and Steve slid across the floor, back dragging painfully through the loose rubble shifting and sliding along with him. It flung him against a jagged spike of ice that had mercilessly punched straight through the ten-foot thick hull.

Another wave of super-heated air rolled through the almost non-existent bulkheads, and Steve could feel his body shutting down, limbs heavy and resistant to his efforts to get up. The cold was leaching away at him, despite being exposed for only ten minutes and the serum. It ate at his thoughts, leaving gaps and stutters, numbing everything.

The last thing he thought was that maybe he should get up and find the shield. Howard would be pissed if he lost it because of something ridiculous like this. Then—

Oblivion.


	4. Fade to Grey

It was eleven o’clock before Jane finally followed Erik’s advice and trudged up to her room. She and Thor had talked about sharing a suite of rooms at S.H.I.E.L.D headquarters, but had shied away from the idea of their relationship put on parade in front of highly classified government workers. Thor had nodded wisely at their joint decision, and had moved on to discussing what Jane intended to put on her walls, and could he not perhaps give her a piece of artwork his mother had given him?

It turned out he’d brought it with him when the Hub had been deemed officially safe enough for travel by Heimdall. Several tests had left the folding chairs, dog, and finally reluctant Shield agent completely intact and unharmed. Which was strange, given the nature of the violent and unpredictable behavior of both the worm-hole theory and the damage Thor had done to the Bifrost bridge; the Hub seemed to be very centered around keeping its passengers in the same form they started in.

It was a painting of Asgard, commissioned by Frigga and wrought by the careful and expert hands of Gersemi, one of her most skilled ladies in waiting. Beautiful glittering gold and crystal, with immense towers and arches, great fonts of water pouring out from beneath it, a bursting and blushing sun shining down, it was highly reminiscent of old impressionist paintings Jane had seen in Chicago and New York.

But as much as those artists loved their craft and painted with care, nothing could compare the lavish attention and passion Gersemi had worked on this sheep-skin canvas. Every detail was there, soft and glimmering, every brush-stroke calculated and fine. It had been strange when Thor had presented it to her, dressed in a brand new pair of jeans and plaid button-up. Thor and the painting glaring anachronisms despite the change of clothing. The grandeur and obvious priceless nature of the gift was off-putting, but Jane had fallen in love with the humming and energetic palette of colors, and demanded it be put up on her wall immediately.

The events of that day replayed in her head as she fumbled with the key to her door. She paused just before inserting it, some sense making the hair on her arms prickle with unease. Jane quietly turned the knob and the door swung open wide. Jane knew, rationally, that nothing could possibly get past an entire compound of Shield agents, but her conversation with Thor about Loki made goosebumps crawl down her neck. She shook off those thoughts. She’d merely forgotten to lock the door, that was all.

Jane stepped inside, and turned to close the door and flip the lock. When she turned back around, Thor stood there, wearing flannel pajama pants, lacking a shirt, and sporting a towel slung over his shoulders. A moment of silent staring ensued.

“You unlocked the door. Of course, I don’t know who else I could have imagined—” she stammered into silence has her boyfriend thoughtfully rubbed the towel over his head. Jane had of course, insisted that they have keys to each other’s rooms. Who knew what kind of late night emergency (of any variety, who was to say what sort of emotional trauma could crop up-) would require getting valuable things out of the other person's room? Thor had agreed even more heartily to this suggestion.

“Did you take a shower?” Thor shook his head.

“I did not feel the need. It was merely rain.”

“So, you spent your entire meeting with Fury and Coulson—dripping rainwater on the carpet?” She had to laugh at that one. Thor’s face broke out into a grin as well.

“The meeting with the diplomatic contingency as well. I do not imagine any love is lost between us.” Thor had a sneaky glint in his eye.

“I imagine inflicting the intricacies of Asgardian politics on someone else for a change is—”

“Immensely gratifying, yes.” Thor finished her sentence. Jane laughed. Thor turned and disappeared into the bathroom, presumably to dispose of the towel. Jane went to dump her nightly reading material and notebooks on the nightstand and sat down on the edge of the bed, toeing her flats off and sighing in relief.

A very large Asgardian body made the bed dip. Jane fell backward, letting her feet rest on the floor. A looming shadow made her open her eyes. Thor stared down at her, the bright blue of his eyes almost radiating light themselves. They didn’t say a word.

Thor reached over and hooked a hand under Jane’s legs, hauling them up onto the bed with the rest of her. 

“I changed my mind Thor,” she spoke as he snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her back flush with his chest.

“About what, Jane?” She sighed as he wrapped his other arm under-over her chest to rest on her shoulder, nose nestled on her neck. His arms and chest felt wonderfully cool, probably due to the rain and wind, from working in the hot and stuffy lab all day. As much as they tried to up the circulation, the power output of the Hub made the temperature insufferable.

“You should give Loki a thorough shaming and send him back to your father for a time out.” Thor laughed silently, chest shaking, breathing in short little puffs against the hair at the nape of her neck.

“Perhaps I will, just for you Jane.” She slid a hand over his arms until she found one of his hands and linked their fingers together.

They lay like that for an unknown amount of time, quietly relearning each other. With Thor, Jane learned to listen to his silences as much as his words. For all that he roared and blustered (the god of thunder indeed) and greeted the world with strength and wonder, Thor was essentially this: centered, vibrant, strong, and quiet.

His sheer size always boggled her mind: spooned together like this, her own torso was barely long enough to reach the top of his jeans, and his feet felt like they were a million miles away, somewhere at the foot of the bed. She could feel the muscles of his upper arms and chest expanding and contracting, like a set of bellows, even when he lay peacefully like this. His shoulders spread out behind hers, almost a pair of wings with their breadth. 

Every so often, he delicately let his lips brush against her skin. It was searing, like aloe on a sunburn.

Sometimes she liked to imagine him as a great machine, carefully crafted, his heart and lungs and muscles and kidneys and all the other gooey stuff inside (if Asgardians had anything about them that was gooey, good god his stomach was practically a slab of granite) are intricately worked cogs, meshing perfectly in time to make this glorious creature function. The being lying next to her, here on this earth, now, with his strong and capable arms wrapped around her.

That was another thing. His hands, so worn and calloused from handling spears, knives, bows, swords, and lately Mjolnir, were larger than her face; she’d seen how unforgiving they were, one day watching him train against some battle-bots Tony Stark had cooked up as an experiment. Thor’s hands had unmercifully ground the poor robots into dust, literally. She would have called Tony’s mood after that any number of things, but unimpressed wasn’t one of them.

And yet here they were, wrapped so gently and carefully around her shoulder and resting ever so delicately against her hip, it was almost unbelievable that they’d ever known any violence at all. Thor was one giant paradox, from his past to his present, from his exterior to his interior, and from his words to his silences. Jane knew she’d never completely know Thor. Hell, she’d never really understand Darcy either, but that didn’t stop them from being friends and pissing each other off.

Jane would never know the depths of space either. But that was okay too.

\-------

It seemed she blinked, and then she was waking up to Thor shifting in his sleep, curling around her even more, if that was possible. Jane squinted at the clock, and read a minute to four. 

And then remembered that Thor still wasn’t wearing a shirt. And had tucked his face quite firmly into the back of her neck, stubble rasping across the delicate hair there. And both hands had migrated, loosely clasping her breasts instead of demurely cradling shoulder and hip.

Well. He couldn’t blame her for whatever happened next.

She deftly wiggled until she lay chest to chest, nose to nose, and stole a gentle kiss, sliding the very tip of her tongue along the sealed bow of his lips. Thor went on breathing peacefully, obviously a sleep without dreams. Jane pouted, then set about methodically kissing just about every part of his face: nose, eyelids, forehead, cheekbones, temples. A vague smile was now on his face, but he still seemed no closer to being awake. She snorted quietly. Jane nosed along his jaw, pressing into the soft, thin, sensitive skin over the bone and along the throat. A quiet hum escaped his throat, and he shifted his head back, exposing more skin, which Jane promptly set about kissing, dry closed mouth presses of her lips, and nipping, short catches of teeth on skin.

Which isn’t to say she neglected his chest. No no, her hands had gone exploring, tracing every dip and hollow of muscle and bone. Fun had been fun, but now…. a gentle circling of one of his nipples, a quick tweak and—

“Jane, what are you—” she stopped his words with a kiss, open mouthed, tracing his lips forcefully with her tongue.

“Do you actually want to stop and talk?” A gleam flared in Thor’s eyes, and he sealed their lips together again, humming deep in his throat, chest vibrating against hers. God, that did things to her she didn’t even know could be done. Like make her head spin and hook a leg over Thor’s hip, pulling him up and over her. He complied, straddling her hips.

Thor parted his lips and Jane had to anchor one hand on his shoulder and the other in his hair to steady herself against the rush of heat and pure want that came with swipe after swipe of heated tongue; against her palette, along the sensitive edges of tongue and cheek. Thor’s mustache and beard chafed her lips and cheeks, setting nerve endings alight all down her arms and making her fingers twitch and fist tighter in his hair and shirt.

Those keys had been a damn good idea.

\-------

“Sir, the temperature and pressure have been equalized. Your word, and they can start,” Agent Hill had stood quietly off to the side for a few moments, before addressing Director Fury. It was time to make history.

He nodded, and Hill was giving instructions through the intercom to the S.H.I.E.L.D technicians and physicians. They clustered around the special Kevlar coated titanium reinforced operating table, holding heat wands glowing an eerie red in the dim light of the procedure room. It was nearly impossible to distinguish any features or indeed to see if there was something in the slab of ice at all.

Fury eyed the expensive heating sticks, wondering why they couldn’ta just used some hairdryers with special trumped up names to make them sound official, but the budget meeting last year had shoved some bull in his face about equal distribution of pure heat, and avoiding the possible air disturbances that can ruin so many delicate procedures.

Beside the Director, Agent Coulson observed with a detached demeanor; only the slight tapping of his right foot betrayed the immense excitement Fury knew he was bottling up inside. The man practically worshiped the old hero, and had gone around with a half smile on his face ever since the expedition had sent back positive results the week before. Again, this was practically turning cartwheels for how much emotion the agent revealed.

After a few minutes, Fury returned to his seat in the corner of the observation theater, and began tapping steadily away at the laptop. Coulson didn’t move an inch. Agent Hill sidled up to take his place beside the other agent, watching water slowly slip down into the drains in the floor of the surgical theater.

\-------

Several hours later, and the only change in the room was the staleness of the coffee, Agent Hill perched sedately in a chair, and the level of tension thrumming in the room below.

And one other thing.

Captain Steven Grant Rogers was now completely free of ice, utterly soaked to the bone, uniform in tatters, but still alive; the monitors attached to his chest quietly beeped once about every fifteen minutes. The blue, red, and white were still brilliant and strong despite the beating they’d taken, the only thing clearly visible in the dim lights.

The intercom crackled, and Doctor Eaton’s quiet steady voice came through.

“We’re injecting the adrenaline, sir.” The damn doctors had been poking antibiotics, vaccines, and god knew what else into the man for the past hour, but Fury knew this was the big one. The do or die.

“Proceed.” The static ended, and Dr. Eaton carefully inserted the needle into Rogers’ I.V. feed. Fury stayed seated, eye trained on the figure on the table, waiting to see if his plans were about to take off, or crash and burn miserably. Everything hinged on Captain America’s return to strength and the world of the living. Fury had read the files and field reports, what had to be miles of antique typewriter paper, recording the brilliant tactical and strategic guerrilla activities of Steven Rogers, and saw a man who could unite a team, make it function like it should. Seamlessly, adaptively, and with strength to spare.

Coulson’s hands were in fists at his sides, and Agent Hill tapped idly on the arm rest of her chair. The room was a mix of ambient noise: the ventilation system, Hill’s tapping, and the faint but steady beep of machines.

Until it wasn’t faint and steady anymore. It became the buzz of the flatline alarm, registering no pulse, no ‘sinus rhythm’, as Doctor Eaton would have undoubtedly commented, if she hadn’t been giving loud, forcefully calm instructions to the medical team.

Whatever they had done, or perhaps Rogers’ body had done, the alarm was now a series of frantic beeps, and the ECG had jack-rabbiting gashes of lines.

"Hill, find out what the hell is happening!" Fury instructed, the irritation in his voice masking the fear creeping up on him.

Hill strode to the intercom."Dr. Eaton, what is the nature of the emergency." None of the medical team bothered to look up or give a response. "Dr. Eaton! What is the status of the patient!"

"If you could give me a damn minute, I might be able to say stable!" the doctor yelled back, voice muffled by her mask, distance, and the operating theater glass. Fury's eye narrowed, but Hill refrained from asking again. Before long, quiet was returned to the room, however the machines' beeps were noticeably weaker.

"Alright. He's stable now. The problem is definitely with his heart, though. I think we're going to have to do a biopsy." Dr. Eaton leaned against the wall next to the intercom, still staring at her patient. Director Fury's eyebrows went up.

"Doctor, I hope you fully appreciate what you have just requested." Hill responded, looking back at her boss.

"Yes, yes, any biological material from Captain Rogers is both incredibly valuable and incredibly risky to remove from his body. But if we don't we can't know what's going on, at a molecular level. That's the only possible thing wrong with him now," Doctor Eaton quoted Director Fury wearily, earning another eyebrow raise from the man himself. The MRI and CAT scans had come back absurdly clean, for a man who was presumably under a lot of strain when he'd gone under. Barring shrapnel detected in Captain Rogers' legs and abdomen, the man was in perfectly good condition. Or so they'd thought. The medical team couldn't even begin to remove the shrapnel and perform other treatments until the man was bought out of his coma; the serum made the skin far thicker and resilient over the wounded areas than S.H.I.E.L.D. equipment could penetrate. Dr. Eaton theorized it was a protective mechanism for when the man's body went into a state of unconsciousness.

"Tell them to do it, Agent." Fury finally decided. It was an all-or-nothing situation; he was going to give Captain Rogers every chance he had to come back.

"Yes, sir." Hill replied.

\------

"Jane?"

"Mmph?"

"Jane would you hand me my phone?" Thor asked, beard prickling her stomach with every word.

"Oh, yeah, here." She searched the bedside table blindly, searching for the source of Train's 'Ordinary'. She handed it to her boyfriend, then returned to basking in a very satisfactory afterglow.

"Yes Agent Coulson?" there was a pause. Then Thor's weight was gone, and he was speaking very rapidly into the phone, something about 'with the Tesseract' and 'a great warrior'? Jane sighed, and resigned herself to more superhero dealings.

"Yes, we will be there momentarily. Jane? Are you willing to come down to the labs?" Thor inquired.

"Yeah, just let me grab something to throw on," she said lazily. Thor tossed his phone on the bed and swooped down to give her a kiss before she sat up.

"Something exciting is happening, Dr. Foster, let us find out what!" Thor proclaimed, kicking his pajama bottoms off his ankles and bounding to the bathroom. Jane couldn't help but give in to laughter.


	5. Mortem Moratur

Tony touched down about six blocks from S.H.I.E.L.D headquarters New York. A nice little empty lot in Hell's Kitchen.

"Later Jarvis," Tony said absently as he stepped from the Iron Man suit and immediately pulled out his phone.

"A pleasure as always, sir," the AI sounded, almost fond. Tony tuned it out. What else was artificial intelligence for but to fill all the empty pits in your heart? As his phone called Pepper, the irony made him feel sharp and hollow. He missed her.

"Tony? Are you out of the lab finally?" Pepper's voice practically danced out of the phone, making him come to a standstill and recite Dalton's Atomic Theory in his head to get the sting of loss to go away.

"Yeah Pep. Actually I'm in New York! Thought I'd report in, like our frowner-in-chief requested." Tony dodged a skateboarder and two pamphlet distributors as he strode towards their illustrious headquarters.

"That was two weeks ago, Tony. I don't know if Director Fury will see you now because-"

"What, is he still mad about the doughnut thing? Or the Hammer thing? Actually, you know, I bet it was the crack about the eye patch." Tony interrupted her. She was taking the news suspiciously well, which meant she either got what Stark Industries wanted from S.H.I.E.L.D, or he'd been down in the lab way longer than was strictly advisable. 

"I'm sure it's all three of those things, and the fact that it's four in the morning." Pepper replied dryly. 

\------

"You wish me--you would have me kill this man?!" Thor said in disbelief, twenty minutes later.

"Mr. Odinsson, as we explained before--"

"You do not understand, a strike from mjolnir would kill this man, protective serum or no." Thor's face was a study in anger and irritation as he squared off with Dr. Eaton who, suffering from sleep deprivation, couldn't mask the exhaustion on her face. Dr. Foster studied the man laying on the table, most of the signature uniform stripped away for the machines and sensors.

"It's incredible what Doctor Erskine did. I've always wondered what his vita rays actually were." Jane mused quietly. Thor, Dr. Eaton, and Coulson all turned to her, expectant. She looked at the three of them with exasperation.

"You all know I'm not a medical doctor, I can't be making these decisions!" Jane exclaimed. Doctor Eaton rubbed her forehead, and Thor stroked his beard. Coulson didn't move a single muscle.

"If we could only access a soul-forge. Then perhaps a better solution could be found," Thor grumbled. Dr. Eaton perked up, as did Dr. Foster.

"Really? What do you use a soul-forge for?" Jane asked breathlessly.

"It is for medicinal purpose. It examines a person, or plant, or animal, at their most basic essence, and detects problems within them," Thor replied. "But they are only found in Asguard, and I do not believe your warrior is in any condition to move through the bifrost." Dr. Eaton's shoulders slumped, but Jane remained just as enthusiastic.

"That sounds like a quantum field generator! Can I--"

"Doctor Foster! Can we please remain on task?" Doctor Eaton exclaimed, before visibly reigning herself in with several deep breaths.

"Right, sorry! Well, you said the only way to get him out of the coma is to cause enough damage to rev his immune system and his healing abilities, right?" Jane picked right back up where Thor had left off; her boyfriend however winked and gave her an exaggerated thumbs up behind Dr. Eaton's back.

"Well, I bet mjolnir could deliver that kind of damage. Thor, they do this to regular humans in comas sometimes. Don't you think it's worth a try?" Jane questioned, as her boyfriend's frown returned. Dr. Eaton looked incredibly relieved.

"If you believe it is worth trying, I will do my best." Thor conceded after a long, tense minute. Dr. Eaton audibly exhaled.

"Thank you, Mr. Odinsson. I've been fighting to wake this patient up for fifty hours straight. Maybe we'll finally succeed." Dr. Eaton rushed off to find the rest of her team and begin to prep Captain Rogers. Coulson nodded and strode out of the room, presumably to report to Director Fury.

Jane regarded Thor carefully.

"So, ready to try your hand at some doctoring?" Jane asked. Thor smiled slightly, then sighed.

"Yes, I am ready. Perhaps even eager. I wish to give this man a chance to live, so that I might hear of his deeds from his own mouth," he replied. Jane smiled back. 

"Good. So, was that a promise, before, to let me see this soul-forge? God I want to see everything in Asgard!" She exclaimed. Thor pressed her fingers to his lips.

"Of course Doctor Foster. All the universe's secrets for you." 

\------

"Alright fair, I suppose Fury needs his beauty rest as much as anyone else, but I wanna see him. And you. Where are you, specifically, Pep?" Tony shouted over the raucous country music spilling out of a nearby bar. 

"What? Tony-fine, I'm at S.H.I.E.L.D. They asked me to come in again, _as the CEO of Stark Industries!_ This is business Tony, not a time for you to poke at Fury and make Maria want to tear you a new-" Pepper yelled over the phone, but he wasn't listening to that. That name was making his heart pound and brain struggle to switch circuits. 

_Maria._

That was....definitely new data. More, new data. To pile on top of everything else ricocheting around his brain and Tony wished he could scream or run or do anything other than let his feet carry him to his destination, but he knew. Pepper was gone. He'd lost her. More accurately, he supposed, she'd lost him. That's what everyone did, ran fast and far and didn't look back. 

"Alright, alright Pepper, I'll behave and be the perfect head of Stark Industries, put away all the crazy for one night-um, morning," Tony interrupted his CEO. There was a sharp silence. 

"Tony? Are you alright? You know that's not what I meant, I didn't mean that, I meant-this is about business, not the Avengers, you can't harangue- oh, I've got to go," Pepper ended on a sigh. "I'll see you soon," she said softly. Tony found all he could do was nod, but shook himself and verbally said goodbye.

\-------

Clint let his knife fly for probably the sixth time in three minutes. Natasha caught it. Like every other throw. "So, are we feeling Tai? Indian? Sushi? C'mon Clint, we've been sitting here forever," she cajoled in her soft, rasping voice. Clint gave her a considering look.

"When have I ever been good at decisions, Nat. I mean really. Hong Kong? Lagos? Kuala Lumpur? All of Australia? Nope. You pick," the last sentence was in sign, just before Natasha flicked the knife back across the room to him. They were propping themselves up in one of the dumpier, junior agent lounges, still not off security-duty in SHIELD headquarters for the night. The full day security would be arriving in a few hours; privately Clint thought it was total BS and figured Fury just liked to humiliate them by making them play lowly security guards.

Which honestly was not incorrect. The 'Avengers' as a whole were more like glorified security guards. For the entire planet. Maybe. 

Clint shook off the unsettling thought. It was dangerous to your health to start pretending stuff like that. 

Natasha dipped her head in agreement, lips pursed thoughtfully. "Indian. Something solid- hello Pepper," Natasha cut herself off mid-sentence, up and out of her chair in a flash and leaning into the hallway. It took Clint a moment to realize that someone must have walked down the hallway, and that it was Pepper Potts, CEO of Stark Industries, and that he needed to put his knife away.

\------

"Good evening, um, Natasha?" Pepper stumbled uncertainly over the name as she tucked her phone into her bag. Tony would be here soon, she'd set everything straight. That would probably involve letting him buying six more pairs of Louboutin for her. But she was still too cautiously excited about her date it didn't really resonate.

Seeing Natal-Natasha, hearing her low throaty tones, had brought all the confusion and terror and grief of the last year to flood her system as she said hello to the agent.

"You look well. And, Agent Barton, hello." Pepper continued, setting her bag down on a table and cautiously smiling at him. Natasha's lips twitched suspiciously, as if repressing a smile. Barton waved back, looking inexplicably guilty about something.

"Thank you, Pepper. How was your meeting?" Natasha responded, the picture of sweet innocence and masterful with small talk. Pepper surmised that although it was just another mask, it was perhaps the most real one in Natasha's arsenal. The mundane and ordinary must feel like a balm after missions. Or maybe that's just how Pepper felt now. Maybe Natasha was just playing spy. 

"It went well, thank you. Although the wet carpet, that was unpleasant. Not surprising though!" Pepper added quickly when Clint rolled his eyes slightly. "At this point I just hope that the building's still standing every time I visit."  


Natasha dipped her chin in agreement. "That's a smart attitude." A short pause ensued, Pepper studying Natasha's green eyes.  


"So, is this a, regular? Meeting place?" Pepper asked hesitantly, looking around the cramped room. Most of the ceiling tiles were tinged a coffee brown, the couches all faded and some had questionable stains. The table she'd put her purse on looked like a stiff wind could bring it down. Clint gave a bark of laughter.  


"Nah, this is where we hide during the end of security shift. Actually, we were just about to go find food if you wanna come-" Clint was interrupted by the flickering of fluorescent lights and an ominous rumble. It was thunder, but something about it carried an intelligence, a purpose. Clint glanced between the two women.  


"I dunno about you, but that sounded weird-not-good, ammiright Nat?" He pushed himself out of the armchair with the reluctance of an arthritis sufferer, but Pepper saw the way his body was tense and arms held slightly out and away from his body. Natasha nodded thoughtfully, also rising from her seat.  


"Care to investigate with us Pepper?" Natasha inquired calmly, sliding her Widow's Bite cuffs into place. Pepper repressed a hysterical laugh. At least this time she'd be walking into a potentially disastrous situation with SHIELD agents that were slightly more talkative than Coulson.  


"Lead on, agents," Pepper commanded as she carefully shouldered her bag.

\------

"You're absolutely sure none of us will be struck by the lightning, Mr. Odinsson?" Dr. Eaton asked for possibly the twentieth time. Thor merely nodded, taking no offense; the doctor was grey with exhaustion, and probably could not ask anything else in her present state of mind.  


"Yet I suggest all should retire to the balcony. The light is overwhelming to human eyes," Thor suggested gently, as a technician passed out goggles with thick, nearly opaque lenses. Jane took her pair, gave Thor a quick kiss, and exited the room. Coulson, taking an extra pair for his boss who'd left to oversee a meeting and hadn't needed any convincing to agree to the plan upon his return, followed Dr. Foster. Coulson already felt as if poised on the edge of a precipice, the Avengers either about to take wing or crash and burn; his boss's unwavering commitment to try _anything_ gave him the feeling that things were about to be very much out of their control. But in the way that history is often made: embracing the risk and saying a couple hail Marys.  


Coulson handed the goggles to Fury, who was waiting in the observation room, and went to turn away, but his boss caught him by the shoulder, and searched Coulson's face with a piercing eye.  


"Good work, Phil." Fury said in a low voice, squeezing Coulson's shoulder gently. Coulson looked blandly back into Fury's face, willing his heart to stop beating quite so fast.  


"Thank you, sir. It was nothing," he replied evenly. Fury gave another squeeze to his shoulder, then turned to the operating theater window with a nod to Agent Hill.  


"That's it then. We're ready." Fury said, a certain fatalistic inflection in the pronouncement.  


"Agent, you are cleared to engage. Begin at your discretion," Hill spoke into the intercom.  


The only indication that Thor heard Hill was a brief nod. Then he turned to the operating table.  
\------  


"Agents, what is the exact chance that something has gotten into the building?" Pepper asked, striding briskly behind Barton and Romanoff. They were hustling down a long white corridor while other jumpsuit-ed agents spoke rapidly into radios and earpieces. The air was thick with anticipation.  


"Oh, definitely zero. Nothing can get in this hunk of government paranoia," Clint replied cheerfully, flipping the safety off of his glock and checking the ammo clip. Natasha tapped her wrists together and the bracelets crackled to life, emitting an almost indiscernible blue glow in the harsh brightness of the fluorescent lights.  


"I mean, on the other hand, anything _we_ bring into the building is, well, I guess fair game? To attack us, I mean," Barton continued. Pepper accepted that bit of news with as much grace and equanimity she could muster, and honestly she had a lot after working for Tony for almost ten years, but she wouldn't hold her tongue.  


"I'm sorry, are you implying that a government agency will be responsible for the destruction of its own building because someone brought something inside?!" Pepper demanded, sidestepping two junior agents rushing to a control room. Natasha gave a light shrug.  


"Does it actually surprise you though?" Romanoff threw over her shoulder.  


"I won't claim that I'm an expert in--whatever it is SHIELD collects but--" Pepper began to reply, but the lights flickered. Then went out.  


The Widow's Bite now burned brightly in the darkness, an eerie replacement.  


"Alright, that's it, time to go. Let's move, Nat. And Pepper," Barton's cheerful voice penetrated the gloom of the hallway. Pepper swallowed hard, but moved after the agents, hoping that Tony would get there soon. Or maybe, not at all.

  
\------  
  
Thor gazed at the man on the table, assessing the bluish tinge of his skin and damp, matted hair. Then raised his hand, palm outstretched. Thunder rumbled, and the lights flickered.  
  
\------

"Hold on a damn minute, I thought he wouldn't need mjolnir!" Fury exclaimed glaring at Hill and Coulson. Agent Hill shook her head in frustration and stalked back towards the intercom. Jane heard a familiar whine in the air, and lunged for the other woman. 

"It's too late GET DOWN!" she yelled, thanking the spirit of Annie Jump Cannon that everyone listened. And not a moment too soon: as the occupants of the room dove to the floor, mjolnir burst through the door and flew through the observation window, breaking it into several pieces with an almighty crash.

"I swear to the almighty above-" Fury grumbled as he military-crawled to the now-empty window to peer down. Thor looked utterly unconcerned with the noise and glass, eyes glued to the patient, his cape and hair soundlessly swirling about him. Without any further ceremony, Thor pointed mjolnir, and the world went white.  
  
\------  


Tony couldn't say for certain (but really, he could, always) but SHIELD's headquarters ran on its own generated electricity, making it impervious to attacks on the local power grid. And yet.

The building went dark as Tony walked up the steps, except for emergency klaxons blaring and glaring red.

"Well. Not the welcome I was hoping for, but a welcome at all from you guys really means something, y'know?" Tony announced as he stepped through a window, its glass strewn wildly over the atrium floor.

"Like Aunt Peggy always says. When in doubt, follow the destruction," he adopted a British accent to repeat the maxim, chortling. And follow the destruction he did, which was mostly broken doors and SHIELD Agents doing very good impressions of the walls around them.

"Agent. Agent. You too, great to see you here," he doffed an imaginary cap and winked at a young man who went brilliantly red. Eventually the destruction ended in an operating theater observation room. Peering in, he registered Pepper with Barton and Natal-Natasha in defensive positions in front of her, Coulson looking enraged and ruffled on the floor, then Fury crouched under the busted window framing the tableau. Tony casually leaned against the door-jam.

"Director Fury, one of your recruits blushed when I winked at him. I find that behavior in an Agent reprehensible! They should be immune to all wiles and charms in this line of work," no one replied, except Natasha, who rolled her eyes and relaxed her stance.

"So, what kind of antics have 'Avengers! The Musical' been getting up to?" He continued, when _still_ no one responded. Fury climbed to his feet, smirking.

"Tony Stark, can I introduce you to someone I'm sure you've known for some time? Meet Captain America," the Director gestured through the window. Tony didn't remember crossing the room, but he sure as fuck remembers the moment he laid eyes on a mythic man who had haunted his childhood.

__

__

"Well fuck me," he breathed out, meeting piercing blue eyes even across the distance of the operating room.

__

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Then Captain America fainted.

__

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this story involves a sped-up timeline, where Loki gathered his forces and started small incursions on Earth before Cap was brought up from the ice.


	6. Pepper Has Everything Under Control

For a time, there is darkness. Not a void, but an ocean of comforting blackness. No identity, no self, just peace.

Then, he is running down an alley, whooping as loud as his (His!) asthmatic lungs will let him. Someone beside him is doing the same. The sun shines hot and insistent, but melts away as quickly as it came, taking the unknown figure with it. That is when He feels the first pang of loss. 

A time of many such moments wash over Him, all with the same unknown person until. Until He looks up and sees dark eyes, a yarmulke, gangling arms. A name comes to him, James....Bucky. Then He knows. His name is (was?) Steven. And this is Bucky. They are friends, always ('Til the End of the Line), and where Bucky goes, Steve follows.

Scenes move a little faster, featuring a woman (fierce, gentle, a constant cough, the smell of a hospital, _Mother_ ) and a man (blurry, distant, with charcoal on his hands, _Father_ ). He feels love, and more loss. A girl from the sixth grade whose hair smelled always of roses and lemon, the sickening and thrilling jolt of a roller coaster, snowball fights on icy Brooklyn streets (these are memories).

Things broaden, widen, to a city full of lights, and adventure. Full of sorrows and ugliness and death, and for the first time Steven knows he is made of hope, and patience, and a burning desire to protect. Grief, loss, and desperation, make a potent mix, swirling around the twin planets of Steven and Bucky.

Like an avalanche, more pain and now panic, lines of men in uniform, screaming agony and begging release, blood and viscera, fountains of bullets and strafing lighting an unfamiliar sky (both a nightmare and a memory). Women with beatific smiles dance in the mud and blood-

A woman, presses close, so close, not close enough, mahogany curls tickling his chin, sweet dark eyes, _Peggy_ gazes up, lush mouth tilted in a half smile he knows (loves) so well--and then he is looking into Bucky's eyes and his playful smirk--

Disjointed gunfire, grenades, the drone of planes, a leering face of Red, the crackle of flames, and both Peggy and Bucky are consumed in fire, and then--

Darkness.

He is free here. Fantastic shapes and colors swirl and dance, guided and formed with his influence. Civilizations rise and fall, galaxies form and dissipate, and he is at peace in the dark.

Time has no meaning, until the whiteness appears, a small, unwavering beacon in the distance, accompanied by a deep humming voice, calling him forward. He does not fear it, but loathes it, resists it. The brightness blots out his beautiful drawings, the peace, the nothingness. He rages soundlessly at it, begging for more time. But he knows, somewhere deep in his subconscious (because that's what this is, his subconscious), he's had too much time already.

He relents, and the whiteness engulfs him.

For the first time in nearly seventy years, Steven Rogers falls into a natural sleep.

\------

Tony wasn't sure how long he sat in the observation room, lost in his thoughts. Someone walking towards him definitely broke that party up. Well, less of a party and more of an internal freaking-out-fest. Natal-Natasha carefully sat down and propped her feet on the chair in front of her. Tony stared at her sleek black running shoes and realized it was the first time he'd seen her wear anything without heels.

"Are you having a mid-life crisis? Did you kill all the shoemakers in Italy? God, that's how I was gonna apologize to Pepper, with shoes, why do you always ruin my life?" Tony complained at her. She rolled her eyes.

"It's called branching out. I saw your shoe closet, Stark, don't pretend you don't know how comfortable these shoes are," Natasha responded smugly. Tony opened his mouth to reply, but Maria Hill walked into the room. Tony might have utterly missed the Natalie-Is-Actually-An-Operative boat, but he sure as hell didn't miss the Burn-In-Hell vibes that radiated from Natasha at the moment. Or how quickly Natasha artfully slumped back, once again above it all.

"Touché. Although I'm very sorry I let you within a thousand yards of my shoes, I need to grill Maria. Bye." He jumped the row of chairs in front of them and sauntered over to the empty window where Agent Hill kept vigil. Over Captain America.

Captain _fucking_ America. 

Howard Stark had had many obsessions in his life that Tony (unfortunately) witnessed, but certainly the most agonizing was the search for Mr. Perfect Star-Spangled Pants. Mostly because it was the quest that took Howard away for the longest periods of time, that left Maria Stark at her wits end, doing her government work and managing a rambunctious son who couldn't be convinced to stop taking the vacuum cleaner apart. Tony grinned at the memory, one of the precious few of his mother laughing, covered in dust, and listening seriously as her son babbled about circuits and suction. Jarvis had hovered in the background, Tony knew that, but couldn't remember if the British man had smiled or frowned.

"So. Maria. I can call you Maria, right? What's the prognosis on our nonagenarian?" Tony dealt his opening salvo, sidling up to the woman. Her spine stiffened, crossed arms going rigid, and she turned to face Tony. And honestly, Tony hadn't seen that kind of rage since Happy's attempt to flirt with a Starbucks barista had turned into a Downton Abbey bashing. But Maria masterfully restrained herself to shooting lasers out of her eyes.

"Agent, is fine, Mr. Stark. Captain Rogers is sleeping, rather than comatose. Once Doctor Eaton and her staff have had sufficient time to recover, they will be taking him into surgery to remove the shrapnel from his body. Then you can meet your new team leader," the jab about the team was well placed. Tony bristled.

"Well thank god the lead is here, I was getting sick of carrying this production on my own," he jibed back. But Maria just smirked, knowing her barb landed. It wasn't that Tony wanted to keep 'leading' (and his definition of leading was definitely limited to buying everyone coffee after a mission), it was the fact that this disaster was going to rise and fall in the near future.

That was all.

\------

Pepper accepted the mug of coffee from a waiter gratefully. It was eight in the morning and she hadn't slept in an actual bed in....at least a day. Tony sat slumped across from her, and she realized that he'd probably gone without a bed for a week. Without sleep for probably thirty hours.

"Tony, I wanted to say, that, what I said over the phone, I _meant_ that we were having a business meeting, not an Avengers meeting, you know I don't have any kind of control over that and I just was being your CEO and trying to look out for the company, I wasn't trying to control you--could you maybe please stop me from continuing to talk?" She finished desperately, Tony's bright eyes laughing at her from across the table. 

"Listen, it's fine. I knew what you meant. Besides, I have literally no idea what your meeting was about, so you should definitely talk about that instead of, whatever forgotten thing you were talking about two seconds ago," he replied over the rim of his triple red eye. Pepper couldn't help but smile ruefully.

Talking about Stark Industries providing revolutionary medicine and surgical implements did not hold Tony's attention for long, unsurprisingly, but he did let her talk for a whole five minutes before interrupting.

"Pepper, when did you start hanging out with Hawk-guy and 'From Russia, With Love'? I'm not judging, but I thought we both agreed after uh, last year that deadly assassins were no longer on the guest list?" he sipped innocently at his drink again, but the affect was ruined by the fact that he'd already drunk it all. Pepper smiled serenely.

"Well Tony, I'm glad you asked, because both Agents Barton and Romanoff graciously agreed to meet us here to discuss that very thing," she responded, waving discreetly to the pair that had just walked into the restaurant. Barton waved back.

"Waaaiitt, wait wait wait! What? You just, invited them here!?" Tony yelped as the agents seated themselves.

"This is a public place, Stark. Very little could stop me from coming in here," Natasha commented wryly. Pepper tried to tamp down her.....discomfort? Uncertainty? Curiosity? About Natasha. They were a part of the Avengers, which she had no part of. She'd told Tony that upfront and in no uncertain terms after he'd recovered from the palladium poisoning.

"Yeah Stark, what're you gonna do, buy the whole restaurant?" Barton snickered. Tony opened his mouth to snap back, but Pepper shot them both quelling glances. Now she was in her element: brokering agreements was her specialty.

"Mr. Stark, Agents Romanoff and Barton are a part of Operation Avengers, and as such, have requested a secure base of operations. Which, based on the inability of SHIELD headquarters to remain secure," here she gave Barton a significant look, that he responded to with a sheepish shrug.

"Is completely reasonable. After gaining approval from the Board of Directors," which happened through a combination of promising new research space for Tony, the positive P.R. of construction jobs, and swearing solemn oaths that Tony would not have any near-death experiences for the next six months. To be fair, the last one only worked when most of the Board Members were thoroughly tipsy at dinner.

"A building will be retrofitted to meet the needs of the Avengers team," Pepper continued. Tony sat up abruptly, leaning on the table, eyeing Pepper. She was entirely familiar with Tony's swings between complete disinterest and laser-like intensity, so she merely met his eye across the table. Pepper however noticed Natasha's surreptitious shifting in her seat.

"I truly, and with all my non-existent heart, regret being born, but Pepper. I need you to do the renovation on the house. The old house," Tony said in his best 'Pepper I'm being serious here' voice. Pepper stared at him, the heart joke like a punch to the gut; knowing him he'd laugh it off if she told him.

"Tony you hate that house, why would-oh. Oh my god, Tony, of all the childish-" Pepper complained, finally losing her composure. Tony gave a lightning quick grin before resuming his earnestness. Barton cleared his throat.

"I honestly don't give a shi-mmmm, crap, about where you put us. We're just sick of sleeping on SHIELD-issued mattresses. If you wanna make us the butt of some stupid personal daddy-issues joke, Stark, we literally do not give a--a crap," Barton cut in, obviously steeling himself before the last sentence. Natasha's eyes glittered with what Pepper guessed was suppressed laughter and not a small amount of rage.

Tony gave another shark-like grin, one reserved usually for the paparazzi. "So Pepper, what do you say?" he asked. Pepper held back a sigh, but only just.

"Fine, Tony. We'll do that. After, though, I'm going on vacation," she warned him. Tony smiled, a real and sunny smile. Pepper remembered a time when that smile made her melt, made her realize there was so much more to life than just the usual assistant-to-the-mega-rich uniformity. She would forever love Tony for giving her the ability to reach and fight and take what she wanted but. It was a terrible irony that she couldn't do that with him as her boyfriend. Communication is key to achieving goals, and she and Tony had never quite mastered that aspect. Probably never would, in any capacity.

"When can we move in?" Natasha finally spoke again, a small smile playing at her lips. Pepper blushed; _this_ on the other hand, she had no trouble interpreting. 

"Hey, has anyone told Banner the good news?" Barton interrupted, after pounding the rest of his coffee. Tony brightened up at that.

"Yeah! Science bro! He needs to live with you guys! Pepper, we don't have the right stuff for him, we gotta fix that, so he doesn't get all ragey all the time," Tony enthused, pulling out his Stark phone. This time, Pepper did sigh.


End file.
